The trademark smile has returned for Holden veteran Craig Lowndes.
And that won't make V8 Supercars series leader Jamie Whincup a happy chappy.
Enduring a difficult last round in Townsville had warranted a rare frown from three-time V8 champion Lowndes.
But he was beaming again on Friday after returning to his Holden team's home track of Queensland Raceway for this weekend's Ipswich round.
No wonder - Lowndes has won the last five races at the track west of Brisbane and made his weekend intentions clear after making major inroads into Whincup's series lead.
"The past few years have been great for us and after testing (at Queensland Raceway) last week there's no reason to think we're not in with a shot again," he said.
"After learning a few things from Townsville, we're in pretty good shape.
"We had a horror run in Townsville. For me, the only good thing to come out of it was that Jamie had a worse weekend so we were able to make up some points rather than lose some.
"We've made up almost 100 championship points I think since Darwin (in June) so hopefully we can get a three-peat in Ipswich and claw him back again."
Overall Lowndes holds the record for most Ipswich race wins: 11.
In contrast, Whincup is win-less from the last eight races at Queensland Raceway.
Lowndes finished fourth and seventh in the two races held on the Townsville street circuit earlier this month.
Yet the evergreen driver still cut Whincup's series lead to 111 points ahead of Ipswich after the four-time V8 champ could only manage a seventh and 11th in north Queensland.
Lowndes is closer to Whincup at this point of the season than he has ever been since the current points system was introduced in 2008.
Even finishing with just the 20th fastest time at practice on Friday could not wipe the grin off Lowndes' face.
Ford young gun David Reynolds (1min 9.59 secs) was quickest ahead of Mercedes duo Lee Holdsworth (1:09.65) and Tim Slade (1:09.77) after Friday's two practice sessions.
Lowndes' Holden teammate Whincup was 13th quickest.
However, rivals were taking results with a grain of salt after Lowndes' Holden team tinkered with its set-up.
"Of course sitting at 20th is never a good feeling," Lowndes said.
"Tomorrow we've got an opportunity to make amends for it.
"But the guys at the top of the tree today were using brand new sets of tyres, which we will probably opt for tomorrow to see where we are, but other than that I'm pretty happy."
The super sprint format returns at Ipswich with Saturday's 40-lap opening event held in two legs.
Two 100km events will be held on Sunday.
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